Author Archives: John

seemed so long, and weeks eternities
between recesses and vacations, lifetimes—
especially when ranch work replaced trouble.

Through the gate like cattle counted now,
they pass six or eight deep—heads, backs
and tails eclipsed and so blurred, we

might have missed one, or miscounted since
the beginning of time. There is a place, like
here, just after that, days had neither names

nor numbers, great herds grazing the planet,
eras when we might have lost a year or two
under endless skies guided by starlight.

                                 …and yet God she’d scarcely got to know.
                                              – Rainer Maria Rilke (“Eve”)

In our minds we have tried to recreate Eden:
worry-free and unabashed as we disrobe
and stride the creek, lounge with the beasts
and birds in harmony, grazing as we go.

And ever since the golden quince, we yearn
for ignorance, for distance from the news,
for the discarded leaf to hide beneath
during thunderstorms of more information.

All becomes a garden when the serpent
leaves deep portals to the underworld
to crawl among the sweet and sour berries,
as Tihpiknit’s right-hand man—to keep us

honest, dispatching the deceitful—where
rivers of fish, wild meat, bone and hide
fat with acorns see through the eyes of trees
and listen to the birds to forecast weather.

                        …we walk the bottom of an ocean we call sky.
                                                – Jim Harrison (“River II”)

It is our nature to believe in more
beyond the surface—though we toil
for plenty here upon the ocean’s floor,

a hierarchy of bottom fish, both slim
and fat—wanting to believe in something
more attainable to all, a free place

for the spirit to try its wings in the light,
beyond the murky depths shadowed by
darker silhouettes of sharks and whales.

How deep the sky! Unnamed on maps,
near Coyote Pass, 10,000 feet above it all,
‘CRITES LAKE’ perforated with an ice pick

in the tin, square bottom of a five-gallon can
placed near the outlet jammed with dark
green backs of rainbow trout spawning,

every one a pound or more in those days.
Just before the moon rose and the granite
glowed like a lantern, there seemed no end

to the stars—far, tiny bubbles glinting
near the surface, our passenger jets
and sputniks streaking beneath them.

                           The world is not what we thought it was.
                                             – Jim Harrison (“Suite of Unreason”)

Much done behind us, I listen in the dark
for predicted rain—like an old friend
I don’t expect to arrive on time, if at all—

wondering if this day is mine to spend
without the human dramas spawned
on flat land for sudden hillsides, or will I

retreat, once again, to cows and calves,
to the chain saw’s whine, go deeper under
the covers of this landscape to pray and

commiserate with my gods, those plural
and lower-cased forces at play that are
indeed the living wonders of this world:

groaking in the tops of gray oak trees,
scarlet hybrids, red-chested sapsuckers
none had seen this far south—bright

harbingers for a cold winter with the bumper
crop of acorns, black upon the ground—a
slim chance beyond that still makes sense.

No alarm clock here, we take turns
waking-up on the hour before the first
branding of the year, lists of implements,

food and vaccines checked in our sleep
before heading up the hill, leaving
convenience for the make-do miles

off the asphalt where anything can happen
despite best-laid plans. We should be
too old, too accustomed to this drill

to toss and turn—we should be sure
and secure with familiar faces and horses,
good hands and neighbors come to help,

like always. Grown old together, we
understand what we have lost—yet shake out
another loop just to grin into the sun.

Like try-outs for the lead,

                    it’s hard to tell
                    who’s not acting,
                    who’s not for real.

                    This cream risen:
                    American prime
                    hoofing down

                    the campaign trail—
                    another year
                    of non-sequitur,

                    closet embarrassments,
                    and hateful insults
                    to endure. Bad karma

                    for hard times, we hope
                    who pulls the strings
                    does not lose interest

in the play.

Headlights dancing down orchard rows,
silhouettes of men, half-loaded bob-tail
stuck in mud, getting oranges in
before the next rain and forecast freeze.

Unmuffled tractor groaning over shouts,
tight chain—there was no quittin’ time
around Christmas in those days, no room
for church or grammar school recitals:

God helped those who helped themselves,
who made hay while the sun shined.
It’s all we really knew of the world:
it took all year to raise a crop to sell.

Before non-cultivation, stinging nettles
high in a young boy’s face, I followed men
swamping field boxes into the night,
and couldn’t imagine a higher calling.

Forecasts vary, computer models change:
dry rain of fiery leaves, stirred and torn
from the honey locust tree, clouds waves

in all shades of gray—a dark flotilla
peeks over the ridge for ships run aground
against the Sierras leaking cargo low

as Blue Ridge trimmed with white ribbon.
We sip whiskey, replay the week and squeal
like children on each gust, tip our glasses

to the work got done. To herds of virgins
readied for the Wagyu bulls, gentle ladies
churning under a full moon. To the mothers

with first calves driven up canyon, now
grazing the north slopes as it tries to rain.
To the four we couldn’t find by day:

awakened by their bawling for babies,
night lit by the moon, they awaited
dawn at the gate while we slept easily.

So much needs not to be said.
Old men grin with their eyes,
save breath with a look

of understanding, yet
the preachers, teachers and poets
go on and on, searching

for resonance, for the magic
words to open doors, when
all we need to do is look.